Researchers found a way to turn an Echo into a listening device

April 25, 2018

Transcript

What's the distance between Tel Aviv and New York?
[MUSIC]
Tel Aviv is 5,660 miles, 9,110 kilometers from New York City [UNKNOWN].
Alexa, start Calculator.
[MUSIC]
Welcome to the calculator app.
What do you want to calculate?
7 times 6.
[MUSIC]
The result is 42.
An unsuspected user believes this session with Alexa has ended once we've got the result.
However, the skill developer developed it in such a way that the microphone will keep recording for a fairly long period of time.
During that time, anything that the user says is transcribed and send directly to the hacker.
Let's see what the hacker sees on his screen
[MUSIC]
We didn't get any audio indication, but we're still being recorded.
But everything is uploaded to amazon, as well as sent to the hacker.
Stop.
Alexa stop.